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Title: Webcam 雀鳥網上攝影機 Post by Bob Thompson on May 2nd, 2006, 5:30pm There is an interesting article in todays South China Morning Post, technology section T4, the article talks about webcams at various nature sites. There is a list of websites mentioned. Also mentioned is the cost of setting up sites, ranging down to as low as US$2000. It would be nice to have somebody or company sponsor a webcam on the new hide ! |
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Title: Re: Webcam Post by Lynx on May 2nd, 2006, 6:33pm My own experience is that the installation cost for setting up a webcam at wild site is around HK$50000 - HK$100,000, depending on the physical conditions of the site and what kind of picture you want to get. The major problem is the remoteness of Mai Po birds hides, in particular at the mud flat, which is far away from existing electricity cable and data transmission cable. The solution is to go wireless using 3G or GPRS transmission for the video capture. The webcam can be powered by solar batteries. |
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Title: Re: Webcam Post by World Cup 2006 on May 2nd, 2006, 6:57pm Good ideas! With both 3G and regeneration of energy being hot topics at the moment, we have good chances to get sponsors. :) |
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Title: Re: Webcam Post by Bob Thompson on May 2nd, 2006, 8:31pm China is a leader in these topics, so surely we can get some one to come forward and sponsor the webcam. Looking at overseas webcams the sponsors get great exposure with there name(s) on the web page. You don't buy much media time for $100,000 these days. If we could get as many hits as lamma.com.hk (1,000,000 per month) the outlay for a sponsor is very little, in terms of advertising exposure |
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Title: Re: Webcam Post by Lynx on May 2nd, 2006, 9:38pm Before being getting too carried away, my preliminary assessment are as follows: 1. The cheapest solution is to install the webcam at either the warden's hut, WWF Peter Scott Field Studies Centre or the Education Centre. I presume that both electricity and telephone lines are available at the building and so power and boardband connection are tere. All the setup costs involved are only the cost of the webcam, which a few thousand HK dollars will get you a decent one with 1M+ resolution. For $15,000, you can get a night-vision one! 2. The second alternative is to install the webcam along the FCA road. As there are light posts, I think electricty power is okay. But data transmission is a big problem because laying a new dataline is ultra-expensive and will cost you more than $100,000 for just connecting a few hundred metres of cable. The solution is to go for wireless 3G or GPRS transmission. In this case, a system controller equipped with 3G/GPRS modem chips is required which will cost around $10,000-$20,000 more, in additional to the webcam. But in Mai Po, my experience is that the mobile phone transmission is not good enough. Therefore, the image transmitted by wireless means may not be stable. 3. The most expensive one will be installing the webcam at the birds hides. There is neither power nor telephone cable. In addition to the wireless modem, you will need solar batteries which are quite expensive for industrial grades that generate sufficient powers for modem and webcam. What I worry is that birds' dirt may cover up the solar batteries very soon. |
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Title: Re: Webcam Post by Bob Thompson on May 3rd, 2006, 8:07pm Check out this web cam, it gets 10.000.000 page hits per DAY http://www.infotecbusinesssystems.com/wildlife/ http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/news/archives/2006/05/03/birds_eye_view.html |
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Title: Re: Webcam Post by Bob Thompson on May 4th, 2006, 11:42am The eagle chick is due to hatch in a day or so - it is worth looking at the webcam |
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